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Figures published by the Department for Environment, Food & Rural Affairs (DEFRA) reveal there were 32,411 incidents of fly-tipping in the city in 2018/19 – or 89 every day. No other local authority in England dealt with so many incidents.

And the mountain of illegally dumped waste included 54 dead animals and 51 incidents where medical waste was fly tipped.

The majority of cases concerned black bags full of household waste discarded in the streets (3,858), fridges and white goods (1,698), tyres (224) and other vehicle parts (75).

The sky-high figures for fly-tipping in Leeds have been revealed (Image: South Wales Evening Post)

The figures have increased exponentially since they were first recorded with 26,831 cases in 2017/18, compared to 2,977 in 2012/13.

While the council spent a small fortune on clearing up the waste investigations resulted in very few prosecutions.

The figures show that Leeds City Council forked out £507,650 on tipper lorries to clear the mess and a further £436,950 on significant or multi-load clearances.

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However, the government no longer publishes the amount councils spend things like car boot clearances, van removals, or single black bag clearances.

It means the total amount the council spent on removing fly-tipping is unavailable and likely to be far higher than the combined tipper lorry and multi-load clearance cost.

The figures also revealed that 32,411 investigations were launched into fly-tipping. However, just three resulted in a prosecution.

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What Leeds City Council said

A spokesperson for Leeds City Council said: “The Defra statistics do not account for important factors such as population size and geographical area. Defra have warned that using this data to make direct comparisons between local authorities is not appropriate and have noted that local authorities do not report consistently.

“In Leeds, we fully report all instances of waste crime, with Defra acknowledging that not all councils do this. Higher incident numbers, as in the case of Leeds, have also been recognised by Defra as belonging to those councils using the latest reporting methods and being more pro-active and rigorous in identifying incidents.

“By fully recording fly-tipping in Leeds in the way that we do, we are able to plan more efficiently and highlight hotspot areas, helping to inform our efforts to combat waste crime. The eight per cent increase nationally shows we are not alone in facing a continuing problem and we have been stepping up both our education and enforcement activity this year.

“We take waste crime extremely seriously, which is reflected in our strong track record of prosecuting criminals and seizing assets of those who continue to handle and dump waste illegally and for profit. Quite simply fly-tipping is a crime which has a significant impact on our communities and we will not tolerate it.”

The national picture

Across England, there were 1.1m fly-tipping incidents recorded in 2018/19.

That was up from 997,553 the year before and is the highest number in a decade.

The incidents saw councils spend at least £112.9m removing the rubbish through tipper lorries and significant or multi-load clearances. Again, the true cost is likely to be higher.

Allison Ogden-Newton, Chief Executive of environmental charity Keep Britain Tidy, said: “A national programme to educate the public about the dangers and costs of fly-tipping is needed now as we have the evidence of a serious and rapidly escalating problem in this country in how we dispose of our rubbish.

“We suspect that, bad as these figures are, the reality may be even worse as many incidents of fly-tipping are being categorised as littering so not being counted.

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“We need a programme of education and engagement in every local authority in the country so that the public understands the law and the impact of their behaviour, both financially and environmentally.

“Our research shows that many people are unaware that they are doing something illegal when they put out black bags or small items because councils are clearing them up extremely quickly and efficiently to keep our streets clean and not telling people that what they are doing is wrong.

“The reality is that this is fuelling the fly-tipping epidemic and costing all of us, as tax-payers, many millions to clean up.

“Britain is becoming a country divided, with more people than ever worrying about the environment and waste and yet equally a growing number of people habitually dumping their rubbish, wrecking that same environment others wish to protect.”

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